Those fearing that the recent release of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD would meet a similar fate to the Wii original can now put their fears to bed. According to July 2021's NPD report for hardware and software sales, Nintendo's HD re-release of the motion control enabled quest topped the charts ahead of Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin. While there aren't exact numbers available, it's safe to say that Skyward will not go down in history as a "failure."
As far as spending goes, the month of July 2021 saw $4.6 billion in revenue across hardware, software, and accessories, which is up 10% from last year. In particular, hardware jumped an astounding 98% from last July with a total of $323 million in sales. Most of that is due in part to the PlayStation 5, which was July's best-selling console in terms of profit. The Switch moved more units but comes in at $200 cheaper, thus putting it behind Sony's next-gen device in terms of dollars earned.
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We already touched on how Skyward Sword rocked the charts, but Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War was the best-selling title on both PlayStation and Xbox for the month despite the controversy going on at publisher Activision Blizzard. So far, the game has remained in the top 10 on the NPD charts for the entirety of 2021 and will probably wind up as the overall best seller if this year's Call of Duty doesn't move a ton of units.
Here are the rest of the games for the month:
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD
- Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
- Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
- Minecraft
- Mario Golf: Super Rush
- MLB: The Show 21
- Spider-Man: Miles Morales
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
- Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Overall, it seems like a good month for games. July was light on new releases, but legacy titles from Nintendo seem to be filling in the gaps. It will be interesting to see if Skyward Sword can keep this momentum going in August.
Source: VG 24/7
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